


Foolish Brothers

by Saraste



Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Day 3 : orocarni OR misty mountain, Established Relationship, Family, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Nwalin Week 2017, Post-War of the Ring, Siblings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-25
Updated: 2017-05-25
Packaged: 2018-11-04 22:10:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 546
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11000031
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Saraste/pseuds/Saraste
Summary: When Gimli comes home from his Quest, he brings home news about the events in Moria.





	Foolish Brothers

**Author's Note:**

> Moria is the Misty Mountains. I don't even knowwhere thus came from? Except canon and my imagination.

Afterwards, Nori holds Dwalin close, when they are finally alone in the bedroom of the set of apartments they have shared for almost a century now, where they weathered a second war, where they waited for a long time for word to come from siblings who did not listen to reason, but went forth with adventure and exploration in their minds.

 

They'll never come back, now.

 

‘I knew,’ Nori says, finally, when he feels like his feet are on solid stone again, when grief has shuddered through his body in the privacy of their bed room, although the look he shared with a resigned Dori before was grief enough, ‘I knew that he’d never come back, there were too many memories for him here.’

 

Such cruelty, what should have been a lifetime spent in the splendor of Erebor had been crammed into a mere week, cut short in the battle-field where loyalty and love had been bought by death and still been in vain. Ori had been so very quiet and still in the aftermath and had buried himself in his work in the years to after. To become craft-wed after having had promise braids had been… Nori was sure his brother had never been truly happy, after the battle.

 

Dwalin’s big fingers are combing through Nori’s hair and Nori listens to the familiar, comforting heartbeat under his cheek ashe leans against his husband, his rock, holding Dwalin up as much as Dwalin is holding him up.’I held onto hope, though it was a fool's hope,’ Dwalin finally admits.

 

‘Bloody Misty Mountains, nothing but trouble,’ Nori says, tone vehement. He was too young for Azanulbizar, by Dori’s standards at least, even when those younger than him perished there, among them a prince younger than the one's Ori had lost before the gates of Erebor. 

 

‘I’ll drink to that,’ Dwalin rumbles.

 

Nori presses his forehead to Dwalin's and breathes deep, steadying himself. _His_ _brother is dead._ So is Dwalin's. Both long ago gone, yet the grief is fresh, unhealed wounds of the heart rent open by Gimli’s news, delivered at his return mere hours ago. Nori had told himself that he had not dared to hope, that he hadn't thought there was any chance of his foolish brother returning, yet… in some small part of his heart he had, foolish as he had been.

 

‘Do you think he's with them now, has been with them all this time?’ Nori asks and his voice is small. He suddenly feels his years acutely, feels old, even if Dori still has decades on him.

 

‘If there's any sense to anything, he is,’ Dwalin reassures, squeezing him gently, his voice a comforting, familiar rumble.

 

Nodi touches his braid in Dwalin’s grey hair, his own fading russet blended in it. At least Ori and Balin got to see them wed, were happy for them, even if Ori had still been hiding his grief. ‘I'm sorry about Balin.’

 

‘He was too much of a Durin. Too Mahal-cursed stubborn when he got a notion into his head.’

 

‘Oh, I know the type.’ 

 

Dwalin chuckles. ‘Let's drink to foolish brothers and what they achieved, even if it was only for a short while.’

 

They do just that. And remember. Even when they never forgot.


End file.
